And you think YOU drive a lot! And on the original drive train:
One way to think of this - it average 100 miles per hour, if she just drove 8 hours a day, with 2 weeks off each year.
Iāve driven over 1 million miles. But it took me about 40 years.
As the 21st century began Hyundai was establishing itself as a brand to be reckoned with and my history with them led me to consider that their automobiles were greatly under rated by the public. About 15 years ago I worked on a Sonata with 400,000 miles driven on an RFD route that had never required towing and the owner seemed confident the car had thousands of more reliable miles left in it. Dollar for dollar I put the Hyundai brand ahead of Subaru and Volvo and certainly all domestic brands. And the 2 dealerships that I have dealt seemed to deserve their great reputations. The most amazing thing in the story is the 200,000/ year put on that car. I have some experience with delivery routes and 75,000/year was a difficult 12+ hours a day Monday through Friday ordeal. Driving 7 days each week would still require 555 miles each day and thatās mentally and physically a grind that few could survive for long. Does the lady deserves more praise than the car.
Hyundai [ ] came away impressed. I am, too.
Hyundai Motor America Chief Marketing Officer Dean Evens said, āReaching one million miles with the original powertrain in just five years is an extremely rare and incredible achievement.ā
Makes it sound like Hyundai was surprised, which isnāt the right marketing strategy ā should be more chest thumping: āWe knew it was that great and this proves itā
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Well, I am AMAZED that any car could reach 1 million miles on its original powertrain, so Iāll cut Dean some slack.
Maybe with proper maintenance a car could go a million miles on the same power train, but when was it being maintained? It seems like it was on the road most of the time. And for one person to drive this much requires that she be behind the wheel 12 to 15 hours a day, 350 days a year. In my humble opinion thatās an absurd waste of a life.
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Not necessarily. Maybe itās long stretches of interstate travel at 65mph or higher. Could be as little as 8 hours a day on average. Still, many people hold down two jobs to make ends meet. 12 to 15 would be less than required with two jobsā¦
What if that same person did this for 5 years continuous at 2x the pay compared to an 8 hour desk job. Then took 5 years off relaxing in the sun while the other person with the ānormalā job was still stuck behind a desk staring a cube walls for 8 hours a day. Would that still be absurd waste of a life? Sounds pretty sweet deal to me if one could swing it. I wouldnāt be so quick to judge, unless you know the whole story. And even thenā¦
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Like I said, at 8 hours a day, 5 days a week, sheād have to drive 100 mph.
What if itās 7 days a week??
5 days a week? 100mph? Maybe itās Robert delivering blood?
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While this an extreme case, you can understand the radical changes we are all going to have to deal with when who know how many million people who drive for a living are going to find themselves out of work. Itās happened before, of course, for example when the people who serviced horses were displaced with the technology of cars and trucks and when people who did laundry and housework were unemployed by electric appliances.
If a self driving car can deliver car parts, it can run 24 hours a day, and needs only scheduled maintenance, but never luxuries like sleep or eating or bathroom breaks, and the chances of it falling asleep at the wheel or becoming distracted because it is arguing with its kids on a cell phone are much less.
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Not a waste if you are a otr truck driver aka profesnel tourist.
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Iām sorry but this is just not a believable story. No one is going to drive over 500 miles a day every day of the year. And even on the freeway going 80 mph, itās hard to average more than 50-60 miles an hour. Not to mention the time for stops to pick up and deliver parts. If youāve done any delivery, its hard to average more than 10 miles an hour. I just donāt believe it, and Iāve been to Kansas. Journalism is dead.
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Thatās what I thought, but apparently Hyundai researched it heavily before GIVING her a new car.
When my Dad was sick I was driving from NH to NY and back twice a week. Distance was about 350 miles. I easily averaged 75mph. Youād have to have delivery stops lasting HOURS AND HOURS to get the average mph down to 10mph.
Personally I think itās possible. A very extreme case. I surely wouldnāt/couldnāt do it.
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Never underestimate what one extreme person can do.
In WWII the Germans were sure there were hundreds of French resistance fighters, because of all the mayhem they caused. It was only a handful at any given time.
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To rack up that many miles, most of the driving would have to be highway driving, the gentlest driving you can do on a car outside of stop-and-go rush hour traffic.
This is a delivery driver, not governed by the laws of commercial truck drivers limiting them to 11 hours of driving a day, so she could easily rack up as much as 800 miles a day while working, and if she shares the car with the other drivers in the family, they can rack up miles on the weekends.
Itās not only possible, but considering her profession, itās believable.
800 miles/day X 5 days/week X 52 weeks/year = 208,000 miles per year
The article doesnāt say where she lives, but if she lives in a state like Wyoming, where the highway speed limit is 75 MPH, she could do that kind of mileage driving 10.67 hours per day five days a week.
ā¦and if she works six days a week, it gets even more plausible.
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Iām surprised that nobody considered gasoline cost, oil and other fluids, tires, etc. Was she being reimbursed?
Or maybe I should ask, was she being fully reimbursed?