I'd be curious if anyone has a general assessment on synthetic oil viscosity vs. regular motor oil at cold temp starts. I know synthetic has a lower viscosity, but just wondering how large that difference is, at say, zero F. I try to idle my car x 30 seconds, especially during the winter, but problem is that the…

Semantics.

Pretty sure that Mazda's original plan was to scrap heap them all, but then realized that they could sell them as salvaged vehicles, with the open indication that of what had happened to them on the ship.

I'd probably have it inspected independently. In my former life as a claims adjuster, we'd hire independent adjusters to spec auto damage, and if we suspected they were claiming non-related damage, we'd ask the adjuster to keep an eye out for it. Those independent adjusters were pretty good at telling us if the…

I'm floored that they're doing this for you —- that cart must've gotten away from the guy collecting carts. I used to work at an insurance company, 90% of our clients were retail grocery stores......and cart claims were very, very common. They were also very easy to defend. I'm not saying I'm proud of those days,…

If the mishap wasn't under warranty, I'd call that great customer service. If it was under warranty at the time, then they definitely should have covered the extra days.

I thought of car washes as well when I read this article. Our local car wash has a bunch of language on a sign outside about not being liable if the car is over 5 years old, or if the vehicle has over 100k miles. All a load of crap.

There are a couple variables in play here:

A lot of summer vs. all-season comments here, but all-seasons doesn't necessarily mean 'good to go' for winter driving. Mid-winter 2 years ago (Wisconsin) I bought a vehicle that had all season Bridgestone Turanzas, and figured I'd just get through the rest of the winter on those tires. That was terrifying. …

Thank you. Dumbest option. Ever.

Did you mean West Point, Georgia? (Kia plant)

Would I? Could I? In a car?

That's why it's a good idea to test drive before buying.

I can appreciate wanting some options and not others that can only be obtained as part of a package, but the truth of the matter is that the individual options you want would cost a lot more if they were independently configurable. (It makes manufacturing those features into the product far more complicated and the…

Had a 94 Civic DX hatch that was pretty close to base (the CX also existed at that time, which was 'base' but the DX wasn't exactly luxury.). I had manual windows, manual locks, manual mirrors. No, it didn't have many creature comforts (came with a tape deck with only fast forward), but it did have bulletproof…

The guys working on product are hardly the same peeps working on red tape.

Save yourself some money, get equal performance. General Altimax Arctic.

Agreed. I think the new one looks like it's trying way to hard.

There's no headroom for the driver, and they can't see anything but straight ahead due to the A-pillar location. Then again, the vertical height between the bottom of the windshield and the top of the windshield is so shallow that it looks like seeing out the front isn't easy, either.