Meh. Dealerships are still worse. And are still a dead weight leach on the process of buying new cars. New cars don’t have these title issues. Used car dealers have the same problems - often worse.

Possibly the title is of questionable legality? 

I think side to side locking would get a lot of the benefits. Especially with independent suspension that does a relatively poor job of distributing weight side to side.

It’ll be really interesting to see how this works out on the ranges. I would think the Rubicon should be easy. I use about half or a little more in my 4Runner to go from South Tahoe to Loon lake through the Rubicon and out to Tahoma. So maybe 3/4 or about 15 gallons of gas. And that includes a lot of idle time on the…

Yeah. Seems like an obvious solution to add a simple dog clutch between the two. Maybe there's a plan for a max off road model down the line. 

Agreed on AHC. the Lexus can vary spring rate and dampening and height. The rivian can only vary dampening and height. And the higher it is the higher the spring rate which is opposite of what you want. The Lexus is the best system I’ve ever seen for optimizing the total package. Id love you see it used in a more…

I think the traction analysis is maybe a little too simplified. It’s rarely all or nothing. And the difference between static and kinetic friction can be low or high. In cases with high delta between static and kinetic, the loss of static friction at one uncoupled tire can result in a significant net loss in friction…

Incidentally they are very safe empirically. Bigger cars are highly correlated with low occupant fatalities per mile driven. There's really no disputing that fact. The data is really clear. 

Fwiw, this would have zero chance of completing the Rubicon. I don't think a raptor has ever done it either. They're way too big unless they're on 40" plus tires. Even a 110" wheelbase 4runner is hard to get through. So I'm pretty sure the expedition would indeed shit the bed. I honestly doubt that it'd even get past…

Obviously off road pretense went out the window decades ago. Embrace comfy highway cruiser!

I don’t think I’d be able to tell the difference if I saw both side by side. But for the headline here I never would have known. Front and rear look a bit more Discovery now I guess. 

Why are building any full EVs? Every EV has enough batteries to make around 10 PHEVs and that would reduce the emissions by roughly 8 times as much as building 1 EV. 

All new cars should be programmed with maps that know the specific speed limit of the road you’re on. No need for a crude speed governor. Just set max speed to the speed limit of the road you’re on.

I like the idea, but maybe if we just had even moderately comprehensive driving education and enforced normal traffic rules we wouldn’t need it. Basically the special license you’re thinking - just make it the base requirement for everyone. And yeah - maybe not every adult should be capable of passing the test.

I think your missing the self interests of the mechanic. His incentive is for you to buy the car that will need bunch of work. So he’ll tell you to buy the ram or the Land Rover or BMW instead of the Toyota or Honda. Because if you buy those cars he doesn’t get any repair work.

Independent inspector. Like a mechanic? Who will then profit from repairing defects? Sure. They’re totally agnostic to your buying choice...

They don’t have to be there to teach me about a used car. But used cars are not widgets. They are less uniform than new cars, so buying a used car requires more information that isn’t going to be on a website. Like “has the black Land Cruiser been smoked in?” Someone to answer questions and interact with at the…

Yeah, but did you have a really shitty software interface that made it all but impossible to reply try comments like this? 

I think sales people are far more necessary for used cars. New cars? I could very happy buy online and have delivered to my door. I'd prefer it. No dealer needed. I’m not sure I’ll ever do that for a used one though. And used car dealers are going to be around for a while. 

I think there is a real place for someone to show me a new car - you know unlock it, show me where it is on the lot, take my info for the test drive. That sort of thing. Beyond that, they usually know less than the average buyer about the vehicle they’re selling. (There’s a few good ones).