Merv's Politically Incorrect Audio Blog

I recently talked to someone in Boulder who had her Prius lifted 2 or 3" so she could mount bigger Blizzak tires. She said it was a snow MONSTER

 

I very much want to do this, but find no reason after 5 Midwest winters with this car. I'm also worried the lift might generate lift at higher speeds and negatively impact my fuel efficiency. Though I guess I could counteract it with a giant spoiler...
I remember my high school physics teacher explaining why skirts and spoilers on most street cars are ineffective at normal speeds and that most spoilers are way too small to actually do anything at high speed anyway, but there was math and equations and I was probably under the influence of psychedelics so the specifics have been lost to time.

 

On the car forums I frequent most people are wanting to lower their cars. Many of them hate the factory wheel gap on my AWD coupe. You can tell they don't drive in snow. I'm not even sure how they deal with speed bumps.

For the most part I'm quite happy with AWD and snow tires, it is actually a blast to drive in light snow or ice, but there are times I wish for more ground clearance. I certainly can't bash through drifts like taller vehicles can, and the bottom of my car drags down the back lane for most of the winter. Fortunately the flat undertray acts like a sled so no damage done.

 

Duh, that's what a Ford F350 Brodozer is for!

 

I have no need for AWD on my 23 Subaru Legacy in FL, but damn the car doesn't hurt my back when driving and it plants on the road quite nicely when doing swift movements. No one cares for the Legacy in the Subaru lineup, since everyone wants Crossovers/SUVs (and I bet Subaru will kill the Legacy after the 24 Model Year due to low sales, since no one is buying Sedans).

I am trying to avoid Crossovers/SUVs as much as I can since being in FL there's no real purpose of them unless you need the space. Plus I do a decent big of highway driving, so really no point needed the extra height from the ground.

 

Agreed. According to BMW the massive wing on a BMW M4 Competition provides 210 lbs of downforce at 183 mph. At normal road speeds you are just not going to notice.

 

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Ya that's kind of what I mean.

Granted, most of their sedans aside from the Corvette + Camaro have mostly been mediocre at best for a while now so maybe this really is the best they can do??

 

What the heck are you knuckleheads doing to flip an SUV? I live in the heard of frozen Canuckland and almost never see this even when people hit the ditch in winter.

 

I assume their ice there is patchier(?), generally speaking.

 

Obviously not leaving the strip bar piss drunk trying to light a joint while wearing no seatbelt

 

I never understood what people find in SUVs. If you actually need an off-road vehicle, buy one, most SUVs aren’t suitable for off-road use. If you actually need space, buy something van-like, it’s much better at providing space than an SUV. They’re heavy, clunky, use far too much gas … If you think about it, there’s nothing at all that an SUV is actually good at.

Plus, in my eyes, they look extremely ugly. The most hideous kind of car available. But I guess I’m more or less alone thinking this — as there’s nothing else that an SUV is good at, it must be the looks. Male variant of buying shoes? Don’t care how much it will hurt when using it, it just looks good!

And still, people are buying them in dazzling numbers. Final proof that humankind will not make it. We’re just too dumb.

 

In Chicago, a lot of people get SUVs not for practicality, which they don't have much of, but b/c they're big and look tough and luxury. A truck can be that, too, but you can't get your crew in the truck. I reckon suburban and ex-urban parents get SUVs b/c they're perceived as being safe (even if they can roll), and they'll protect their own at any cost.

I dunno. All of this talk of batteries and EVs sometimes seems besides the point to me. As many have said, the battery charge still has to come from electricity generated somehow, probably not (yet) green. And the battery components have to be mined. And the batteries and vehicle will go into a landfill eventually. It's an improvement over gas, sure, but still a band-aid.

What I don't get is why America, especially, won't properly invest in public transit and city-to-city trains. Chicago to NYC is one of the most flown routes in the US. Why not a high-speed train between the two? It would be wildly popular. America's too big for a proper train system, I hear people saying. But hasn't China had high-speed rail for, what, fifteen years now? Seems like you can do Beijing to Shanghai in 4h30.

No doubt the lobbyists have much to do with it. No doubt Americans love their cars. But the complexity of various EV solutions at some point starts to point up that there are existing solutions and older tech that are just as good if not better. The bike and the train.

I sold my last car in 2008 and have relied on train, bus, and bike ever since. All in NYC, SF, Chicago, and now London, it's true. Big metros with decent to excellent public transit. And, sure, I take Ubers when needed. But I rarely miss owning a vehicle. Don't miss parking tickets, speeding tickets, insurance bills, gas bills, etc. I can hire someone with a truck or a van when I need something moved. I buy groceries around the corner when I need them and eat them fresher for that reason.

Plenty of folks in smaller British and European cities don't have cars. Think about all the small and mid-sized American cities that used to have streetcars. Heck, that still have streetcar tracks. Work from home means a lot of families might now be able to get away with just one car.

Also, as a commuter cyclist, you start to fear and resent drivers. Cars are noisy and dangerous. They pollute cities in ways that don't just have to do with emissions.

As audio nuts, we all understand what noise pollution is.

Also, it makes me extra crazy when I see how many cars have only one person in them. What a waste.

I grew up in the country (rural Wisconsin), so I get having a car. Heck, I owned a truck for quite some time. But I find it very liberating not to have either now.


Sorry if this sounds like a green/lefty harangue. Again, I've owned and enjoyed vehicles. Used to love long drives with the CD changer all filled up. But I also think America's push towards moar, bigger, newer--cars, houses, whatever--has been not so great for the country or the world.

 

Rated your post epic --- because it is good sense.

But I'm still far from chucking the car. It is a pure luxury, and really not necessary for the journeys I do. But I remain addicted to the sense of independence it gives me. And I still enjoy the driving, even in this congested, crazy, law-ignoring city.

However many ways it may be wrong... My mum drove until she was unable to go out at all, a couple of months before she died just short of her 90th birthday. I have twenty years to go.

 

We must just be much worse drivers here in the US of A. I see multiple flipped SUV's, trucks, jeeps every winter. Very rarely see a flipped car (maybe one every 2-3 years).

----edit----

I don't either... I live on the rail corridor that would run from NYC to Chicago. I would love to see multiple high speeds come thru daily... instead we just get the daily slow ball express that pulls into the station at 2am.

High-speed rail has been long talked about and argued for, but no one will pony up the $$$. Instead we keep pouring money into repairing the interstates between the two cities(I-80/I-90).

 

Based on my experiences car shopping with my wife, sister, and mother at different times, I think the increased ride-height makes a lot of people feel safer and more in control on the road. That's one thing I heard from all three, that they felt safer feeling higher up, especially with so many large SUVs and pickups on the road. My sister also felt like SUVs would be better in the winter (she lives in Minnesota) and I could not convince her they weren't necessary.

My preference is for hatchbacks and cushy full-size sedans. I've owned a Grand Marquis, Fiat 500, Mazda3, and currently drive a Ford Five Hundred. I owned the Mazda3 when I met my wife and she hated driving it because it was "too low to the ground". She doesn’t mind the Five Hundred as much because seating position feel is more upright, but she’d still prefer an SUV. She also hadn't owned a car in more then a decade because she lived in DC and didn't need one, so she was a bit timid as a driver, which probably didn't help. But I do think a lot of people feel safer in a car that makes them feel bigger on the road, which helps explain the proliferation of SUVs.

 

I learned to drive on a minivan, and after that inherited my parent's suv that I drove into the ground for almost 20 years. At this point sitting in a car feels really weird to me and I don't like it.

I don't want the monster suvs, I prefer the compact size, but mainly I want the clearance on the bottom so I don't mess up my ride on potholes, backlane snow ruts, or lately the city has been installing ridiculously tall speed bumps which scrape my car.

 

Everyone likes driving around on a sunny day with the windows rolled down and the music blasting. No one likes sitting in traffic or creeping through snow.

I get just as much liberation--more, really--from cycling on a beautiful, or even not so beautiful, day. And I don't have to sit in traffic. If it's raining, I take the bus.

Of course, the big downside to bike commuting in a city is that it's dangerous--b/c of cars. The fewer cars, the more pleasant cycling is, the nicer the air gets, the less stressed out everyone is.

If you live in the countryside, it's a different story, of course.


Chicago - Cleveland - Pittsburgh - Philly - NYC high-speed rail would change the country for the better. People in the heartland could see the possibilities. What a dream.

Could easily be a reality. Why re-invent the car when you already have the train? Even if cars get to zero emissions--and they won't b/c they need to be charged--they still take up ridiculous amounts of space. Listen to a recent Fresh Air interview about how parking has changed America. You still sit in traffic, you still pay for parking. You can still kill someone else or yourself if you or someone else isn't paying attention.

Not all new tech is necessarily better tech.