Jaguar F Type-R Coupe without a doubt, looks great, sounds fantastic and I can drive it cross country anywhere without having to plan my trip around charging stations.
Yep,but 280 miles would work for me(and they will go that far-if driven correctly)"No sound "works for me.
Years ago, as a,used car, the Ford Maverick had a much worse repair record than the same car badged as a Mercury Comet according to Consumer Reports. I wrote to CR about this,and CR replied that that is the what the data from the survey showed. I then wondered why the data came out the way if did. I then read a test of the Ford. Granada /Mercury Monarch twins in Popular Mechanics. The average age of the Mercury Owner was 7 years higher than the Ford Owner. The older owners probably drove more conservatively and probably had more money to better maintain their cars.
Consumer Report’s data comes from its subscibers. I subscribe to CR and fill out the surveys. I am probably not typical of the buying public and I don’t think that most subscribers are representative of the general public. On the appliance and lawn mower.sections, I am not even eligible to respond. Our stove,dishwasher, refrigerator, wash machine and lawn mowers are over 20 years old.
I’ve come to the conclusion that CR is for the younger and more affluent folks. CR tests Tesla cars and rates wines. I drive Toyotas and drink Hamms beer which I bought a case of 30 on sale for $9.95. Even the breakfast cereal reports are meaningless to me because I buy the house brand which isn’t rated. I keep up my subscription so that I know,what rich people buy and,if I ever get rich, I’ll. know,what my purchases,should be. However, at age 73_my chances of striking it rich are very slim.
So that means if you strike it rich tomorrow, you have to immediately give up house brand cereal and Hamms beer . . . ?!
Near my work, there is a Mercury Comet, which apparently gets driven regularly. I say apparently, because it’s never in the same spot, and sometimes it’s on the other side of the street. So I assume it’s being used
I think @Triedaq nailed it. Different models (even if mechanical twins) attract different owners, resulting in different reliability. The is different that the CU test scores.
I know that Consumer Reports tests models that appeal to the tastes of the majority of its subscribers and readers. I am just surprised at how this base has changed in tastes and values. For example, CR recently tested the Dodge Challenger. This type of automobile certainly doesn’t fit my needs or is something I would purchase. In CR’s report on refrigerators I don’t have the need for an upscale $5000 multidoor refrigerator. I have a separate freezer in our attached garage for long term storage. It’s fun to read about these things, however.
“I lost any respect for Consumer Reports years ago when they rated the Corolla-based Geo Prizm lower than its identical cousin the Corolla in their “unbiased” testing. Same car, same assembly plant, same suppliers, same everything except the badges.”
…or…maybe not…exactly the same…
Back in the days when Saturn was still in business, CR did a test of mid-sized sedans, and they included the Saturn Aura, Chevy Malibu, and Pontiac G6, among others. In their article, they noted that, even though these 3 GM offerings came from the same assembly plant and had identical engines and transmissions, there were some differences, and as a result, they did rate these cars somewhat differently as to their driving characteristics and creature comforts.
Among the differences were seats that differed in the amount of padding, the location of the lumbar supports, and even the height of the rear seat. This last factor actually led to a difference in the amount of rear leg room among these 3 “identical” models.
There was also a difference in the placement of the A/C vents, and I recall that they criticized the very low placement of the vents in one of these GM models. Of course, the Pontiac had that marque’s characteristic 8 small A/C vents, rather than 4 regular-sized A/C vents. (I guess Pontiac buyers were supposed to think that their A/C was twice as powerful…)
And, IIRC, CR remarked on slight differences in handling as a result of slightly different suspension tuning on those 3 “identical” GM mid-sized cars. The bottom line is that cars can come from the same factory and can have identical mechanical components, but can still have somewhat different qualities in some cases.
And even the same car can be optioned differently (tires, suspension, seats), so one Corolla could test differently than another Corolla. Lots of variables.
I could sacrifice some of those features, as well as some of the luxury, for a lower initial price and perhaps more range.
That’s exactly what they’ll be doing with the Model 3. They used the S luxury car to help build recognition and capital. The 3 will be the car “for the masses,” so to speak.
Fortunately, Ford, GM, and Chrysler are in no position to gang up on Tesla as the but three did to Tucker back in 1948. The big three were still building cars on the pre WWII designs. The Toyota Prius really forced other companies to think about hybrids. Tesla has really advanced the EV. I often wonder where the auto industry would be today if the big three back in the 1950s had thought about making real technological advances rather than figuring out how to put tail fins on their cars.
The auto industry has always been slow to react. They keep playing catch-up. Look at emissions and gas mileage. Changes were made when they were FORCED to change.
“figuring out how to put tail fins on their cars”
Today they waste time and money figuring out how to (yet again) redesign the headlights to make them more expensive to replace and uglier. And how to make the tires even lower profile. And how to reduce visibility even more. And how to make the electronics even more difficult to operate.
I think that the auto industry actually went backward in many ways in the late 1950s. I much prefer the 1955-7 Chevrolet to the 1959. The 1957 Buick was better looking than the 1959 in my opinion. Furthermore, there weren’t any real mechanical improvements in these cars.
I dunno guys, a whole heck of a lot of advancements were made between 1929 and 1970, without regulatory requirements being a factor. I believe there’s plenty of evidence that the automotive industry would have advanced anyway. The overwhelming and ubiquitous expansion of the use of computers in automobiles in areas not driven by regulation even provides IMHO hard evidence that the industry would have made use of computer technology naturally too, even if there were no regulatory requirements.
I wish they would get off the emission bandwagon(the feds) the law of diminishing returns has made further gains a joke,provided the gen source is clean probaly the electrics are going to be the only cars allowed intracity in some locales.Some cars now actually purify the city air they ingest.
Kevin, I agree wholeheartedly.
Considering the global warming crisis we are facing and which is due to get a lot worse, I’m fine with emissions controls across a wide swath of industries, including car manufacturing. There is no such thing as “good enough” when we are still dumping enough carbon into the atmosphere to result in a net-positive.
Now, what I would like to see is emission regulations applied more fairly across the board. I’m fine with having to have a close-to-zero emission vehicle, but the factory across town should not be allowed to belch enough crap out of its smokestack to equal tens of thousands of cars.
Oh-oh. Here we go again, off on the “great debate”.
Personally, and as regards personal vehicle emissions AND highway infrastructure development, I think the EPA has gotten to the point of being counterproductive. They’re now setting standards that go beyond emission reduction to being unobtainable without making new cars the province of only the well to do. If they keep millions of old beaters on the road because they’ve driven the cost of new cars too high, how is that saving anything? And if a new highway that would expedite the movement of traffic is prevented because someone saw an eagle’s nest in the woods (that actually happened) and traffic is thus forced to go farther and through stop & go areas, how is that helping the environment?
And then there’s diesel trucks. Why am I prohibited from expelling almost any hydrocarbon molecule whatsoever during the 2 hours a day I drive my car when convoys of diesel dumptrucks are blowing harmful components into the air in huge clouds 12 to 16 hours a day continuously? Why does not the EPA simply stabilize requirements for cars and move on to the dump trucks?
The root cause is simple. The EPA is a cabinet under the executive branch, and the executive in charge panders to special interest groups. That’s where the campaign money and the voting influence are. Too many have pandered to the “greenies”, none more than the current one.
I guess in summary I think the EPA is, like most other regulatory agencies, out of control to the point of being counterproductive.
Major increases in EPA’s diesel regs for semis. I haven’t seen a smoking semi in years. Don’t know about other diesels.
Right now the semis are being regulated much better, and they are a lot cleaner. But it’s taken decades. The major problem that I see are the local diesels that run all day, like the dump trucks.
However, I do believe that the EPA needs to back off on privately owned passenger vehicles and refocus its energies. Continuing to grab higher and higher goals out of the air has become counterproductive.