brandegee's discussions

Sounds like a flatspotted tire to me. Read more

Not really the base models. Just the base engine. You can get a Forester 2.5i 6-speed with Premium trim and sunroof. It's similar for the Impreza and XV Crosstek. Premium and Premium Sport trims can be had with a manual. But the Limiteds are CVT only, I think.

I suppose if VW ever bothered with an Eos R it would cost a ridiculous $46K or something.

How about the day before yesterday's technology? VW sees fit to charge more than $42K for a loaded Golf IV with articulating roof.

You can get a Golf convertible! It's called the Eos. Well, okay, it's based on an old 5th-gen Golf. But it's close to what you would get from a Golf droptop. Read more

Not really a huge waste of cash. The entirety of the FCV program has generated IP totaling 5,680 patents, all of which has been made freely available. This Toyota acting like a Bell Labs or, more accurately, an IBM, which functions more as a contract research company these days. I'm willing to bet at least some of… Read more

Well, in the 1980s what the AE86 offered was cost. It was probably much cheaper to buy, operate, modify than an E30. Nowadays that's not true, so it's mostly a matter of taste. Read more

Yeah, that wasn't much help at all. Curbstoners are basically unlicensed dealers masquerading as private sellers. The term originates, I think, from census takers who cheat by sitting on the curb and filling out blank forms themselves.

Great point. The difference between what a dealer will offer and what a private party sale will realistically fetch is well worth an hour or two of aggravation. Dealerships charge a *lot* for the convenience of not having to unload an old vehicle. It's a raw deal for the consumer. On my last private sale, that… Read more

Good lord, the same SM is still there?! It's a white car from what I remember. I'm no longer in Maine, so I haven't been back to that area (although I'm occasionally Downeast). I'm glad the shop is still up and running. The DS19 I saw was claimed to have been the one used in a Mel Gibson movie.

Yes, French manufacturers proliferated like crazy after 1890. I think Peugeot was among the world's top sellers of cars in the 1890s, with dozens of models and sales of 300 a year by 1900. A strong base in manufacturing bicycles and carriages helped get France jumpstarted, and Michelin's pneumatic tire of 1895 helped,… Read more

If you hate scraping, by all means use something that means you don't have to. Easy? I dunno. It was -33F in my town on Thursday, and mostly negative temps forecast all this week. 2-3 minutes of defroster, coupled with literally 20-30 seconds or less of scraping is plenty for prepping even on the coldest morning. Read more

At idle, the typical 4-cylinder engine burns 0.01L/min, or maybe 0.02L/min in extreme cold. So you're saving pennies, even at 8USD. The benefits of letting a frigid car warm up to operating temperature have been well covered here recently, and could easily offset the fuel being burned at idle. Read more

The tough part to determine is average person. Drivers in the 19-aughts were wealthy and elite white Europeans and Americans. If you count them, then you could argue for that decade. At least one Darracq and several Benzes were making more than 200 hp in that decade.

I looked closely at one of these recently but we went with an almost new Saab at similar money. This is a good choice, and so is the E46 wagon, which has a pre-xDrive system. The only caveat when comparing this to an E30 is weight: the E91 is about 800 lbs heftier than even the heaviest E30. The E91 is still a lot… Read more

Good point about aircraft businesses, but Hispano-Suiza and Lorraine-Dietrich both made high-end automobiles for many years before the war started. The aircraft industry was a side business that became a big deal for Hispano-Suiza, but . However, Voisin (purely aviation) and Salmson (compressors and pumps, and later… Read more

Maybe a 7/9 scale NSU TT? The NSU was quite a bit longer. Even the Hillman Imp, which I thought might have been around the same size, was larger and heavier than the Suzuki. Read more

I was really surprised, too, but that generation of Sonata (EF) was designed in the mid-90s. It wasn't really until the 2005 Sonata that Hyundai was really competing, feature- and safety-wise. Lower-trim models of cars like the Rio, Aveo, Accent, Versa and maybe others, didn't have ABS right up until 2011.

I'm pretty sure ABS was optional for this generation of Sonata, depending on trim level. But it could easily have been a failed ABS/TCS module as well.

The difference with the Porsche engines is that they are more "square" than "long". The issue with the size of the flat-12 showed up in the Ferrari BB cars, where they had to mount the transmission under the longer V12 engine, which spoiled any advantage the cars might have gotten from a lower center of gravity. Read more