T1B

What the world needs, another hypercar.

That Italdesign Zerouno looks like a tricked out Toyota Supra.

88, why aren't you buying American, like me? My Fusion Energi was made in...err...Mexico, I guess.

BTW...this American car will leave any of those Italian supercars eating dust.

88 wrote: My partner just bought one of these (not this color - his is the tricked out turbo job):

Holy shit!!!

88 just outted himself!

As for hot-rod CUVs, my current rental mule is a '17 Escape with the "big" ecoboost (2 liter). 240 hp, good low end grunt. Plenty quick enough to send you to jail or the morgue. I'll bet that Macan that your uhhhh....partner has is pretty sweet.

As for that guido supercar, the side view is kinda nice, but that nose is fukking hideous. I believe that car design from an asthetic point of view goes, peaked sometime in the 60s. Cars today are without a doubt, lightyears better, but they don't look as good.

Sudden Sam wrote:Yep, I know what you mean. No way I could get in and out of any of those things.

Bought a new F150 in December... Rides great. Shockingly smooth ride with nothing in the bed. Chintzy interior, though. I went low end and the door panels, armrests, handles, etc are cheap as shit.

I've always wondered about that. I get the whole price point thing where a company needs to,save in one area to ,ale itself competitive in another, but the interiors of cars seem needlessly cheap. You get into a Mercedes and the blinkers have a solid "clunk" sound and feel when you use them. The doors feel like bank vaults slamming shut. The transmission doesn't lurch when it goes up or down through the gears.

It seems that the American automobile market focuses on the exterior appearance and a paint job, some muscle under the hood and waits a year or three and then makes those same cosmetic adjustments. It's a bit like the motorcycle market. Suzuki makes beasts like the Gixxer, but the gearbox is rough. Honda's and Kwak's gearing is smoother, but contrast that with BMW and those are like butter.

So German engineering is good? That's a news flash!

We currently have a Navigator and Suburban and both are on par or better than some of the "luxury" brands costing tens of thousands more. I haven't found the interior to be cheap in either one.

My hands don't have to leave the wheel to change A/C or radio settings or to use the phone. I found the doors to feel far more solid than the X5. Plus you can't beat the V-8 on the Suburban, power when you need it or it shutting off half the cylinders on highway cruise.

Left Seater wrote:We currently have a Navigator and Suburban and both are on par or better than some of the "luxury" brands costing tens of thousands more.

I don't know about you, but I call any vehicle that starts out at $63,000 a "luxury" vehicle.

I have found the interior material quality to actually be better in recent years with domestic brands. There is one company who's interiors seem cheaper these days, Toyota. They used to be quite good, but the last few years, very cheap feeling.

German stuff still does have that feel of quality that they alone seem to be able to pull off, but their actual quality has dropped. 30-40 years ago Mercedes build quality was light years beyond anyone. Today, not so much. A friend of mine who has owned a few over the years says he'll never buy another, unless it is a 30 year old turbodiesel. His parents had a early 2000s turbodiesel E class and he says it is an absolute POS. A few years ago, there was an article in Road &Track about a german company that finds 70s S Classes and refurbs them and puts a modern Benz V-8 in them. They then sell them for roughly the GDP of some countries. This article went on and on about the amazing difference in the level of workmanship. Those Nazi bastard were at the top of their game in the 70s, when the domestics were building absolute shit. At that time they were obsessed with building everything as good as humanly possible. When I was in high school/college, in the early 80s, I had a job as a valet car parker so I got pretty familiar with those 70/80s benzes when they were new. They absolutely reaked of quality. Every now and then we'd get one in with over 100K miles on it and it drove exactly like one with 10K miles. You got the sense that one of those things would NEVER wear out. There are old benz taxicabs in 3rd world shitholes with over a million miles on them. I doubt a new benz will hold up as well. The engine will do well, but the rest of it will fall apart.

Roach wrote: The ecoboost looks dandy but do we trust it yet for the long haul. Or should I go with the familiar and proven v-8 5.0 liter?

How did you decide that, and is that the 5 1/2 or 6 1/2 bed.

woo woo new trucks

I'd consult with Martin.

Rack our north messican comrades!

It's a fukking truck. It should have a plain jane interior. I suspect it has cruise, tilt wheel, power steering and AC that will freeze you out. You'll have to do without the leather lined reading lamp.

As for the engine, I suspect it should be fine. Hopefully Ford got all their shitty head gasket designs out of their system in the 80s with the 3.8 V-6. What a POS that was. I would be more concerned with the tranny. BTW, has anyone heard from AP lately?

Sudden Sam wrote:My bed is 5 1/2 feet.

You could have Moving Sale stop by for a sleep-over. He'd get lost in there.