My father’s 1992 Pontiac Sunbird used to have an intermittent horn fault that only happened when it was very cold. It was hard to test because mostly it would happen at night, so we just had to pull the negative cable to shut it up, but eventually he uncovered the cause: the cold would contract the plastic of the…

Still daily-driving this two years later, so...

I definitely think that’s a dope way to approach the problem as well (at least for X people, where X is the number of bikes you can attach to the vehicle). My preferred solution is off-roader with off-road trailer, plus bicycles, plus hiking for the “last mile”.

Yeah, as someone who spends a lot of his time in the wilderness of North America, these sorts of things are simply too large for a lot of the more interesting terrain. Whether you’re talking about mountains or forests, swamps or deserts, these are appalling in tight terrain. You’re much better off towing your “home…

Its ability to go absolutely anywhere (and its utter inability to stay clean doing it).

Not a first responder, just someone who drives old cars (often 300,000+ mileage) in challenging conditions. Plus I am also old (and in challenging conditions) so I’ve just had a lot of years worth of need to be towed. 🤣

XJ. It depends on which transfer case you have whether putting the TC in N will actually decouple the front and rear wheels, in situations where you have to flat tow or otherwise move the vehicle without power. My 95 will do it fine, my 92 would not, and I’ve had mixed results with 93 and 94 that surely are…

So what you’re proposing is additional government regulation and/or equipment. You’re saying that, in an ideal world, there should be some sort of provision for CHP to have their own equipment, or to essentially commandeer tow trucks, to act in priority cases. I’m not opposed to this in concept - though the execution…

David’s Jeeps, like mine, do not require sophisticated means to unlock the wheels from the transmission. They require a socket set, or some wrenches. You just pull the driveshafts. Ask Me How I Know.

I regularly wait multiple hours for tows, in places with no protectionist clauses at all. There is a limited number of trucks per vehicles that need towed.

This is standard operating procedure when too lazy to dispose of a body yourself; the car is essentially payment for the disposal and cleanup. Similarly, “free barrel of cement”, and any fertilizer cube that isn’t empty. There’s a community for this sort of thing. People helping people, you know.

That’s what kills me: it’s like they got the tiny details right, and then somehow missed the big stuff. Now, the fact that you and I were both driving rentals surely doesn’t help, because they’re gonna be thrashed, but even so: terrible engine and transmission, limp handling, just bargain nonsense all the way around.…

I used to rent a car every few months, because my family lived six hours away, with a five-mile bridge between me and them, and my only car has no doors and sometimes its wheels fall off and so forth. Most of my rentals were random Toyotas and Hondas and Nissans and VWs, and they were all some degree of “fine”. They…

Thanks! It’s my daily driver, and my only car, and I live where we get 150-200 inches of snow a year; our average snow depth has been around five feet lately. Doors have been off so long they don’t really go back on, so...it’s a commitment. 😁

A Jeep Cherokee XJ with Rubicon Express’ 3.5" Super-Ride lift kit. Famously incapable of anything approaching rock crawling - for that, get the Super-Flex, whose control arms will allow more extreme angles - it corners level and quickly, and with 31x10.5 tires, feels more like my 1986 BMW e30 than any other car I’ve…

I dislike lift kits. For anything other than a dedicated off-roading rig, it introduces compromises that I’m not willing to make. Where is your SUV going to live most of the time? Be honest when you ask yourself that, and mod your car accordingly.

Shut up and take my money. Any running, driving car at this price is a steal, but one of this era and condition is worth substantially more (to those of us who prefer cars of this era; practically worthless to anyone else). My 1995 Cherokee has twice as much rust, and has already had its floors replaced once. It also…

Induction stoves are surprisingly efficient. While they draw a lot of power - up to a couple thousand watts, down to a couple hundred - they turn a lot more of that power into heat than resistive electrical heating does. This (and the fact that they run comparatively cool, with no flame) makes them ideal for use in…

This brings up some genuine torsional rigidity questions. The fiberglass can’t be THAT structural, so the rigidity of the rack doesn’t factor into the unibody’s structure. I’ve been wanting to cut out my XJ’s roof for years, so I can put in a retractable soft top, but didn’t want to do it until I’d fully caged it; is…

*waves hand* Hello! I’m both an off-roader and a conservationist. I off-road to get to points in the wilderness that aren’t practical to hike to (and then bike and hike beyond those points!). I’ve installed a quieter muffler on my Jeep, so I can not scare the wildlife quite so much. And I hate irresponsible…